


Quaking

by Devolucao



Category: Naruto
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Natural Disasters, PTSD, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-10
Updated: 2012-08-10
Packaged: 2017-11-11 19:35:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/482141
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devolucao/pseuds/Devolucao
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Following Oorochimaru's attack on Konoha, Raidou and Genma attempt to pick up the pieces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quaking

_~when it's all over we still have to clear up~_

The day after the funeral, Raidou wakes to the kiss of damp autumn air and belling wind-chimes. His body is leaden with pain, old aches on top of new, and every movement must be slow accordingly, every step carefully measured to minimize the shocks. He finds Genma at the kotatsu, sprawled face-down across a spill of papers, pen tucked behind his ear and a half-eaten bag of sweets within guilty reach. 

As much as Raidou hates to wake him, he's bound to get a stiff neck like that. So he bends carefully and touches his wrist. "Gen--"

Genma rockets upright with a shocked yell, missing Raidou's face by scant millimeters. "Yes, Hokage-sama, right away!"

The silence is short, but incredibly dense; it hangs in the air like canon-shot, echoing dully.

There's a rustling outside, then a bird sings, and somewhere distant a dog starts barking. Life will continue at its own pace, come war or celebration. Raidou sighs and rubs distractedly at his face. 

He looks around at the mess this place has become in just two months time, at the collected detritus of two people who have hardly been home to sleep, let alone tidy up, and wonders where his sense of purpose lies now. 

"Genma," says Raidou, bending to retrieve a few stray pages. "Why don't you let me handle this?" 

He deflates, sagging backwards on vaulted arms. "You're injured. You should be resting."

"I can rest while I work," Raidou insists patiently. "And you shouldn't overdo this stuff, you know how it--"

Genma snatches the bag sullenly from Raidou's hand. "I swear, you act like my foot's gonna rot off if I have the least amount of sugar...."

"It's cumulative, Genma. I shouldn't have to lecture you."

Genma sighs, or rather growls, bearlike and cantankerous. "I've been good," he says dangerously. "At a time like this, are you honestly gonna begrudge me a little candy?" 

It's counterproductive arguing with him when he's like this, so Raidou lets it keep. "Why don't you go lie down?" he urges, instead. 

Genma does; right there beside the table with his head on the floor and the cushion still under his hips. He leers filthily at Raidou for a while before finally turning onto his side with a snort. He's asleep again within seconds. 

Raidou settles down at Genma's feet and sets the documents in order. He helps himself to a cup of coffee while he's at it, then a bowl of dry cereal, and then it's down to brass tacks. He's looking at their last report, his and Aoba's and Genma's, the mission that had picked up where Hayate left off. He's looking at several nights of intense boredom and sleeplessness, frayed tempers at having to so quickly bury their grief, at Genma's square economic script which so casually sums up the end of Hayate in less than a paragraph.

Cut through the trunk, no evidence of weapon left on scene.

(Black blood, gray skin, buzzing flies)

A loud crack erupts from someplace outside, a reverberating blast that rattles the dishes and unsettles the coffee in Raidou's cup. The shaking starts and so does he, biting with an almost audible crunch into his lower lip. He feels warmth well in his mouth and reaches up to wipe it away, sees the light red smear on his fingertips, and curses. The swaying persists, and he hears shouting outside, sees the light-fixtures and curtains gently swinging. He reaches for Genma's shoulder, and just as the quaking has reached a crescendo, it stops. He holds his breath. More shouting from outside, and somewhere a bird sings. He blows out. 

At a time like this, he thinks ruefully. He almost wants to laugh. Or cry. Do something to diffuse the tension. The apartment's no longer trembling, but he is.

Genma shifts and turns over, blinking sleepily up through his mussed fringe. "Was that--"

"Earthquake," Raidou sighs. "Don't worry, it was just a baby."

"You bit your lip," Genma notes, frowning. "You okay?"

Raidou draws a deep hissing breath through his nostrils. Then out again. "Yeah," he says, still stubbornly sucking at the wound. "Somehow."

He has no idea how he ever manages to finish the report, his brain is a million miles away and he can't stop thinking about the dirty dishes, the unwashed laundry, and the left-overs sitting in the fridge. There's just so much left undone, he thinks. What if he hadn't survived that day? He imagines Genma facing the shambles of his empty apartment alone, the remnants of their last meal together now covered in mold flowers; then he thinks about Hayate's parents, his siblings who have no idea the condition in which he was found, and he feels like an ogre. 

He is lucky to be alive and sitting here. He ought to be damned grateful. He's got some nerve, he thinks, crying now.

Genma sits up and takes the pen from his fingers, slides the papers away so they won't get stained, and hugs him gingerly from behind.

He apologizes. It's rare for him to get so emotional. "I don't even know where this is coming from."

Genma folds both arms around his waist, twines Raidou's fingers with his own, and says, "Like hell you don't. It's alright, you've earned it."

He says, "Why? What've I done?" A tear oozes into his mouth, and then another, and he tries to remember what they'd taste like. "Any idiot can get in the way of a kunai," he sobs. "What's so fucking praiseworthy about that?" 

"You're not just any idiot," Genma says. "You're my idiot."

That's right, he is. The report will keep, Genma says. He says if old man Homura doesn't like it, he's welcome to take it up with the next Hokage, whoever that is. He says it's too early in the morning to have to deal with bullshit, and Raidou still hasn't eaten yet.

"I had cereal," he sniffs.

"That's not a meal," Genma insists. "Keep skipping and you'll catch the 'beetus."

Raidou coughs up a soggy laugh, says he doesn't think it works that way. "Whatever we have, then. That'll be fine." 

He sits out on the balcony while Genma forages in the kitchen, listens to him banging around in there, and watches fair-weather clouds roll lazily across the sky. Somewhere a radio crackles faintly to life, and a voice confirms what nobody in Konoha needs confirmed: there was a small temblor just moments ago, seismologists say it was magnitude five-oh, no major damage reported and no reason to panic. Of course Raidou expects it'll be downgraded later. Soon, just like the attack, people will stop talking about it.

Many of them already have. New news is such a rare commodity here, people will jump on absolutely anything, no matter how trivial. 'Today, the world's largest daikon was officially entered into the book of records....'

And his mentor is still dead.

Genma leans his head out the door. "I put some yams on to boil, it's all we have that's not junk food."

"Hm?" Raidou murmurs. "That's fine."

He looks out through the railings, at the slant of shadow cast against a neighboring stucco wall. Warm orange roof tiles against deep blue-gray against cream. It's just past noon. Right at that moment he hears the scuffle and scrape of the usual lunch-time mob converging down below, the busy clank of ladle against pot, the hearty 'welcome, welcome' of the chef, and the wheeze of bodies settling wearily onto stools for the first bit of rest they'll have all day.

He used to like ramen, but after his sense of smell went, he found the texture too off-putting; too much like earthworms. And here is another reminder he doesn't need. He shifts painstakingly to get a better view of inside, and lies back with his eyes shaded, his head pillowed on a migrant floor-cushion no longer deemed suitable for indoors. He listens for the ding of the egg-timer, the clang of the pot-lid, and the easy slap of bare feet on tile. He has to get reacquainted with the possibility that the smallest things may startle him again; that a voice from behind when he's not expecting it could potentially ruin his day. He looks up just as Genma's folding to sit.

His hair's tied back messily now, and he's changed out of his rumpled uniform into a breezy white linen tunic and hemp short-pants. He's got a steaming coffee mug in each hand, and all that's missing is a straw hat.

Raidou reaches out to take one of the mugs. "Not going in today?" He asks.

"Hn. For what purpose?"

"Well," Raidou pauses to sip his coffee, which is at least hot. "In light of recent events, the head office tends to get hinky when people don't show up for days at a time." 

"I'm already on it," Genma sighs. Then, cupping his free hand to his mouth, he hollers over the balcony rail. "Oiiii, Ebisu! Oi!"

Raidou nearly dumps his coffee out. "Are you _mad_?!"

If he is, Ebisu is as well. He actually answers, without pause, from two stories below where Genma had spotted him approaching the lunch counter. "Shiranui-kun, is it?"

"Yeah," Genma calls out. "Tell whoever gives a fuck that I'm calling in today."

Now Raidou can see Ebisu glaring up at them with his shades tilted down. "You'd better have good reason at a time like this," he says.

"Tss. My partner's injured. He needs me to look after him."

"Do not," Raidou mutters.

Genma shushes him, then calls out again. "He says you have pretty eyes." Too damn loud for a Wednesday, or any day. "And this is legal, in case you wanna challenge us."

Be that as it may, they are short-handed on the ground. They need every able-bodied person, Shinobi or otherwise, to do their part. He stops just short of using the words 'insurrection' and 'treason', but they are heavily implied. 

"I pulled for you when you had that marriage interview," Genma calls out, grinning. "How'd that go, by the way?"

In the end, though it is with much reticence, Ebise capitulates. Those are his exact words. And this is the last favor he'll ever do for Genma.

"What got into his britches alla sudden?"

Raidou scrubs at his eyes and groans. "Who even cares? You are such a toss-pot sometimes."

Genma bolts up, rudely dumping Raidou's feet off his lap. "Ah, speaking of pots!"

He brings the yams out steaming, with a plate of rice-crackers--which Raidou likes for the crunch--and dried figs, which they eat with their backs pressed against the glass doors, their shoulders and thighs and feet touching, while the next shift scrapes their stools back at the lunch counter below. 

"Have we fucked out here yet?" Genma asks, as Raidou's picking the seeds from between his teeth. "You think they'd see us down there?"

"I know they would," Raidou says. "And don't take that as an endorsement."

Genma says, "You know me too well." He lays his head on Raidou's shoulder, then quickly picks it up again.

"No, it's alright," Raidou says. "I'll let you know if you're hurting me."

He settles back down, muttering, "Kinky." 

After they've sat long enough for their tail-bones to go numb, they go inside and make several valiant attempts to set the place in order. Because it needs to be done. Because this is part of the deal, Raidou explains, as if Genma's a kid playing hooky. 

They succeed in getting the bed made, and the floor cleared of debris, and that's good enough by Genma's standard. He insists they take another break, at least sit down while they sort through papers, but there's still a pile of dishes soaking in the sink. "At least let's get that done," Raidou says, brandishing his scrubber like a baton, trying to rally his troops. 

Genma loops a dishtowel and makes like he's going to lasso him with it. "Watch where you're pointing that," he drawls. "'Less you want a war. And I'll go to war...."

Raidou flicks soapy water at him, tries dancing out of reach, but Genma's got him well cornered. "Don't you dare," Raidou hisses. "Rat-tail me with that."

They lock eyes. Genma puts on an angry pout and flicks him deliberately across the butt. Raidou scoops water from the sink and douses the front of his shirt and pants, laughing even though his ribs ache and his lungs protest, letting Genma grab him and press him into the counter-top, forgetting because he wants to forget that he is invalid and shouldn't be doing this. That he shouldn't even be here right now.

He can feel Genma's cock through the wet clinging layers of his clothes, Genma's lips on the back of his neck, and he is dizzy with it. He has missed this so very much.

Genma says, "I'm not hurting you, am I?"

"A little," Raidou breathes, "but I don't mind."


End file.
